


to love again

by bxnelight



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Angel Wings, Angst, Battle of Alicante, Dark Clary Fray, F/F, Heavy Angst, Maia loves Clary so much oh my g0d, Maia tries to bring Clary back, Possessed Clary, The world is burning around them but they only see each other, how did i turn this prompt into heavy angst, yall are warned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:00:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21637036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bxnelight/pseuds/bxnelight
Summary: with a soul imbued with jonathan's influence, the only thing that could ever bring clary back to herself again was love.and maia would give every bit of her soul to return that love to her.(a fic that didn't need to be so painful but Alas)
Relationships: Clary Fray/Maia Roberts
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12
Collections: shadowhunters sapphic ficathon





	to love again

**Author's Note:**

> i'm so sorry i didn't mean for any of this to happen
> 
> written for the #shsapphicficathon, the first week's prompt that is "This is not your destruction" and "If I know what love is, it is because of you." so i took these prompts and ran with it and somehow i made it way more angstier than it has to be. (i'm sorry)

She stood at the edge of the world, her palms still burning with scorching sunlight. Blood dripped like sweat onto the earth beneath her feet, and everything stood still. The white noise grew louder and louder, and with every laboured breath she took her eyes squeezed shut even tighter. She did this. Every drop of bloodshed was split on her conscience. 

_I couldn’t bring him back._

She watched as her brother tore through Alicante. The demonic energy that fueled him took the form of darkened smoke, that was charged with a blinding convolution of harnessed power. It was her power, her corrupted angelic power. She watched as he brought his hands close to his chest, drawing out from his endless reserve of power, and throwing the electric swirl of light out in every direction, sending shadowhunters and downworlders alike falling to their knees. There was nowhere to run. 

She did this.

She gave him everything he needed to become this. 

\------------------

“Clary,” The voice rang and echoed, sounding so out of reach, like it came from a mile away. She reached and reached, but no matter how far it seemed like she travelled, it felt like she would never surface. The voice came again, familiar as it is she could not remember who it belonged to, and the voice that once pulled her to the surface now dripped with mockery. As if the echoes of her name only came to remind her of how far she was from reaching it. Darkness surrounded her, and like a wisp of silk she felt her anger wrapping her in a suffocating cocoon, consuming and overcoming her.

“Come back to me, please. This isn’t you.” It was useless. The currents rushed past her as she let herself accept the cold, unfamiliar body of water. 

_Maia._

She couldn’t breathe. Her eyes flew open, now zeroed in on the flicker of light at the top of the waters. It’s Maia, it had always been Maia. She swam and swam, the cold creeping into her bones and settling in like lead, pulling her down. 

_Maia, I have to get to Maia._

Maia’s voice never faltered. It got almost close enough to touch. Her fingertips grazed the surface, and as she broke the tension of the water, she could almost feel Maia’s touch on the other side. 

“Clary, please, it’s me. Please.” Maia chokes out the words that looked lost on Clary’s unseeing eyes. Perhaps it was sheer desperation that made Maia see that bit of consciousness in the once green coloured irises. It was now consumed in demonic darkness, staring down mercilessly at Maia without a hint of the love it once carried for her. 

The seraphic blade in Clary’s hand glinted in the moonlight. The sharp tip grazed Maia’s cheek, leaving a bead of blood to gather on her face. 

There was a flash of something that broke through the darkness of her eyes. All it took was that split second of hope for Maia to take a step towards Clary despite the blade against her skin. 

“I love you.” She stared at her, willing to look past the cloak over her eyes and at the Clary she knows. 

“Come back to me please, I love you.” Maia begged, the tear that slipped from her eye joining that trickle of blood on her cheek, stinging it ever so perceptibly. Her words clearly didn’t reach Clary at all, and they did nothing to break her out of the demonic grip on her soul. 

Maia could almost see Clary’s soul diminish and die out under the vice grip of her brother’s influence. The call to blood that Jonathan held over Clary’s head like a looming threat had been slowly but surely consuming her, until every bit of the pure and utterly brilliant wealth of light that Clary was got overtaken. 

She cried for the love that she could no longer see in those eyes. 

Maia’s eyes fell shut. The swipe of the blade that she anticipated would fall across her neck never came. She fell, and when she awoke, Clary was gone. 

—————————————————-

Maia leapt out of the portal, disregarding the falling embers around her. She could hear Magnus’ and Luke’s panicked voices call out her name, but with a muttered apology under her breath, she ran and never looked back. There on the towers of Alicante, was a silhouette of a girl, her blood-stained wings extending from her back, sunlight dripping from the tips of her fingers. 

She climbed up the pile of rubble, holding only Clary in her sight the entire way up. Here, barely ten steps between them, she could see the way the other girl’s angelic wings flowed from the arches of her back in defeat. She was almost hunched over herself, and there was a very tangible wall between them. 

“Clary.” Her voice trembled. The angelic-blooded turned around slowly. Her eyes weren’t the full-black that they were when Jonathan imbued his demonic blood in her. Yet, there were unmistakable swirls of darkness that still contaminated the otherwise softness of Clary’s ocean-green irises. 

There was so much confusion and pain written into her features. It took a long breath for their eyes to meet, for recognition to seep into those eyes again, but Maia still didn’t see in them what her heart hoped so badly to see. 

“I did this.” It was a breath, a sharp exhale of disbelief that threw those words out of Clary’s mouth. 

“No, this wasn’t you.” Maia wanted so badly to reach out, to hold her, to leave these words on her skin until it seeped into her bones. 

“I couldn’t bring him back. I let him do this.” Clary uttered, each word sounding more pained than the last. “I couldn’t even love my brother enough to bring him back. I did this.”

_I couldn’t love you enough to stay._

The screams of the fallen on the battle ground below rang through the air, like a relentless mob feeding into Clary’s thoughts. 

“This isn’t your fault Clary. This is all Jonathan. You did everything you could, I promise.” Maia’s words flew over her, and past her ears. 

One step closer. Maia tried to catch Clary’s darting eyes, blinking away her own welled up tears. 

“We tried to bring you back Clary, but he was too strong. It’s not your fault, please.” 

“I didn’t love him enough. I-” Their eyes met again, and Maia almost crumbled with the pain in the other's eyes. 

“I couldn’t love you enough, Maia.”

Her voice broke, the words that came pouring out taking the breath right out of Maia’s lungs. She couldn’t speak, feeling her chest go numb at Clary’s voice.

“They said, that I had to hold onto you. That we… us… we were the only thing tethering me to my soul.” The lump in the throat almost left her gasping for air. “But I couldn’t stay, I couldn’t love you enough Maia.”

Maia was desperate, grabbing onto every tendril of her thoughts.

“That’s not true, that’s not true at all Clary. I… I saw you fight. You fought till the very end. You loved me so much you fought till the very end. For us.”

There was a quiver of her wings, a sign that Maia’s words were getting past the walls she had raised between them.

“There is so much love in you Clary. So much. You never meant for any of this to happen. This is not your destruction.”

Maia inched closer.

“You are light, and love, and every fibre of you fights for the good of others.” Maia stopped just out of reach of the trembling girl before her. 

“This isn’t you, Clary.” The light that shone from Clary’s palm seemed to reignite, burning ever so slightly brighter. 

“But I wasn’t enough. I did this.” Maia’s heart lurched when a sliver of anger raged across her face, the dark swirls taking over her eyes again. 

“Please Clary, listen to me.” Maia reached out, taking Clary’s arm in her gentle but firm grip, not letting go even when Clary tried to jerk away. 

“Listen to me. This isn’t you. You’re love and light and good and everything this isn’t.” Maia said, desperation taking over her voice. She poured every ounce of hope she held into Clary’s eyes, willing it to wash away the swirls of darkness creeping in. 

“You’re the only reason I learnt to love, Clary.” Maia had to squeeze her eyes shut, her memories of all their firsts rushing to the front of her mind. 

_The first time she saw Clary from across the room, the red hair standing out against a sea of people. The distinct memory of how closed off her heart had been before Clary came crashing in with her fierce will and overwhelming purity of her intentions. Her light and innocence that insisted on staying with her even as she faced her cruel fate head on. How she swept Maia off her feet and showed her how much she could love life and how life would love her back. That it was okay to learn to love again, and open her heart up to make a home of a person._

“If I know what love is, it is because of you. You came into my life and brought every bit of colour into it with you.” Maia never loosened her hold on Clary, whose soul was desperately trying to reconcile her words with herself. 

“Please, come back to me, please, we can end this together.” She brought her close to her chest, as she waited for nothing and everything to happen.

A whisper.

_Maia._

It felt like a lifetime ago since she last heard it. Her name like a kiss against the side of her neck, exhaled and breathy, and all but branded on her memory. 

Her name, in the cadence of Clary’s voice, carrying with it the familiarity she always knew. 

She was almost too afraid to pull back and see the same cold darkness in those eyes, but when she did, she found it. The love that once shone so brightly in the oceans of green now reflected back at her. 

There was a shared, held breath between them before everything came crashing back down. The lost time, the relief, and the longing came upon them in a wave, and their lips met. 

Up on the towers of Alicante, a silhouette of a winged angel and a girl who learned to love grew into a blinding light, as sunlight poured out between them, and the battle bowed at their feet, quieting and dying.


End file.
